


Deserve

by TherapyBard



Series: Bad Things Happen Bingo [7]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Caleb Widogast Deserves Nice Things, Caleb Widogast Needs a Hug, Caleb Widogast's Backstory, Could be read as pre-widojest, Dissociation, Don't know how I forgot to tag that yesterday, F/M, Flashbacks, Hurt/Comfort, I don't fully understand D&D mechanics but please just go with it, M/M, OC is an awful person, POV Beauregard Lionett, POV Caduceus Clay, Panic Attacks, Past Child Abuse, Past Rape/Non-con, Protective Beauregard Lionett, Protective Caduceus Clay, Protective Fjord, Protective Nott | Veth Brenatto
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-04
Updated: 2020-11-07
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:08:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27380938
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TherapyBard/pseuds/TherapyBard
Summary: A bad encounter with shopkeeper in Zadash leads to Caleb reliving parts of his past he'd rather never think about again.
Relationships: Beauregard Lionett & Caleb Widogast, Caduceus Clay & Beauregard Lionett, Caduceus Clay & Caleb Widogast, Caduceus Clay & Fjord, Caduceus Clay & Jester Lavorre, Caduceus Clay & Yasha, Caleb Widogast & Yasha, Fjord & Beauregard Lionett, Fjord & Caleb Widogast, Jester Lavorre & Caleb Widogast, Jester Lavorre & Yasha, Nott | Veth Brenatto & Caleb Widogast, The Mighty Nein & Caleb Widogast
Series: Bad Things Happen Bingo [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1942036
Comments: 35
Kudos: 169
Collections: Bad Things Happen Bingo





	1. Damage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A shopkeeper isn't happy when Caleb refuses to accept her special deal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: Attempted coercion into unwanted sex, allusions to past rape/non-con, panic attacks, flashbacks, dissociation  
> This chapter is written for the Bad Things Happen Bingo prompt Hallucinations.  
> Note: This story is a direct sequel to chapter 5 of my last story, Free From the Past. I don't think it's necessary to read that to understand this, but it would help. I don’t know exactly how D&D spells work, but I’m pretty sure the spell Phantasmal Force can do what happens in this chapter. If anyone is interested in me defending that point, ask me in the comments.

As much as Beau loved Pumat Sol, she hated the fact that he was basically the Cerberus Assembly’s go-to supplier. That especially sucked when the Mighty Nein was in desperate need of more healing potions and the assembly had just run him dry. ‘Corrupt bastards…’ At least the world’s nicest Firbolg (tied with Caduceus as well as every other Firbolg she’d met) was able to point them in the direction of another magic shop that the assembly usually left alone. That was where she, Caleb, Yasha, and Jester went while the others stayed to discuss the possibility of adding cool shit to their already badass weapons.

The shop, Genira’s Gallery, didn’t look like much as they walked inside. Sure, the shopkeeper had a nice collection of spell components and potions, but it was nothing like Pumat’s shop. ‘Oh well. It’s not like we’re looking for anything fancy.’

“Hi there! The name’s Genira, though you probably got that from the sign out front,” the woman behind the counter said. She stood slightly shorter than Beau with long brown hair, pale skin, and big blue eyes. “Well, aren’t you a nice little group? What can I do for you?”

“Pumat Sol said you’ve got some healing potions here. How many you got?” Beau asked.

“I’ve got…” She took a second to think. “26 currently in stock last time I checked, 100 gold a pop. 750 if you’re looking for something more powerful, though I don’t remember how many I’ve got of those.”

“Really? We’ve bought healing potions for, like, half the price before.” Jester said, leaning against the counter.

Genira smirked. “Well, those potions weren’t mine. Mine are the best in town, and since Pumat’s out, probably the only ones you’ve got.” She glanced over Beau’s shoulder at Caleb, who had been hanging back with Yasha. “Since you’ve got a spellbook, I assume you’re a mage?”

“Oh, um…” Caleb took a few steps towards them. “Ja, I am.”

“Well, pretty boy, I’d tell you not to be so shy, but it’s a good look on you. Still, there’s no need to be scared. Based on the size of that book, you could take me any day.” She winked.

“Well, that’s not always… Um…”

Jester took Caleb’s arm and pulled him the rest of the way to the counter. “She’s flirting with you,” she mumbled. “Go with it.” Beau looked Genira over again. She certainly wasn’t her type, way too scrawny, but if Caleb was into her she had no objections.

Genira laughed. “No, he’s fine. Like I said, shy’s a good look on him. Now, as I was saying, I know us wizards can be a bit squishy. We need these bad boys more than anyone, so I can see why you guys are so desperate to get your hands on some. I’ll cut you fine people a deal. Buy five regular potions or two of the big guys, get one regular free.”

“I’m not buying your whole ‘best in town’ thing,” Beau said. “There’s gotta be a reason the assembly takes Pumat’s stuff and leaves you alone.”

“That’s because Pumat’s got a bunch of extra hands, making him good for bulk orders. I’ve only got me. I put love and care into every single potion I make.” She looked back over at Caleb. “You understand me, right?”

“Ah, I… No, I agree with Beauregard.” He looked at Beau desperately, as if checking to make sure he’s doing the right thing.

Genira’s smile faltered. “Aw, I can’t be mad at you. You’re just too pretty. How about this one, final offer? Buy one get one free for everything in the store.”

“Wow, that’s  _ really  _ good,” Jester said.

“If…” Genira held up a finger at her, eyes never leaving Caleb. “You’re willing to have some alone time with me in exchange. I promise I’ll make it fun for both of us.”

Caleb flinched back and grabbed Beau’s arm to steady himself. “Um, I… Ah…”

“No,” Beau said. “If you’re looking to buy sex, there are plenty of actual sex workers in this city.”

“No one asked you,” Genira said through her forced grin. It softened as her eyes landed back on Caleb. “Don’t let your friend speak for you. The choice is yours.”

“Ah, no. Thank you for the offer, but I’d… ah.”

Yasha stepped forward and put a hand on his shoulder. “Thank you, but I think we’ll find someone else.” She led a numb Caleb out of the store with Beau and Jester right behind them. Right as they reached the door, Caleb froze with deep fear in his eyes. “Are you okay?” He didn’t react.

Beau turned around to see the shopkeeper smirking. “What did you do?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?”

Yasha tried to grab her arm, but she moved too fast for her. She punched Genira in the face, sending her flying towards the ground. Caleb collapsed at the same moment. 

Jester barely managed to catch him before he fell. “Caleb!” He began hyperventilating and speaking rapidly in Zemnian.

Beau went to punch Genira again but was successfully restrained by Yasha this time. “You should thank your big friend,” Genira said. “What I just did was not illegal, but you just physically assaulted me.”

“We need to leave,” Yasha said. Beau looked back at Caleb, who was still lost in his own head, and nodded. The two of them helped Jester get him out of the store.

“I’m gonna message Veth. Someone count,” Jester said. Beau let go of Caleb and held up her fingers for her. “We’re outside Genira’s. Caleb is really freaking out. She did some sort of spell on him... He isn’t hurt... Come help us calm him down.”

There was no time to celebrate Jester using the exact amount of words. No matter what they did, they couldn’t get Caleb to match their breathing, or even react to them at all. Veth and the others came running down the street after a few minutes. Beau and Yasha gratefully stepped back to let Veth and Caduceus take over calm-Caleb-down duty. Fjord asked what happened and Beau gave a basic summary.

Caleb eventually began to breathe at a healthy pace, but still seemed out of it, as if in a fog. Beau turned around to see Jester painting a dick on the side of the shop. ‘Fuck it.’

She walked back inside, followed by Fjord and Yasha. “What the fuck did you do to him?”

“I see you brought back up.”

She raised her staff. “What. did. you. do?”

She sighed. “It was a simple illusion spell, no damage done. I just wanted him to see what he was missing out on.” She smirked. “Maybe feel a little bit of it, too.”

Beau’s vision went red. When Caleb first told her about his training, she had no target for her anger. Now she did. She ran forward and knocked Genira back on the ground with her staff before beating her with it. Hadn’t Caleb already been hurt enough? He didn’t need this shit. Beau should’ve gotten Caleb out of there the second she started flirting. Even if she had no way of predicting this, he’d been obviously uncomfortable from the start. She was such an idiot. Caleb didn’t deserve to suffer for that. Genira did. 

“Beau… Beau!” Fjord grabbed her arm in the middle of her tenth swing. “We can’t kill her.”

“Why not?” 

Yasha took her other hand. “We’ll do something later. Caleb needs us right now.” Genira stood up and downed one of her healing potions. Just like that, she was back to perfect health, no damage done. Beau wanted to scream.

* * *

Caduceus had always wished there were spells to cure emotional pain as well as physical. Few people made him wish this as often as Caleb. As he half-guided half-carried his friend back to the rooms the Gentleman gave them, he did his best to manage his emotions. Caleb needed a rock and he would do everything he could to be that for him.

Caleb curled up on the bed the second Caduceus put him down. Veth crawled up next to him and gave him a kiss on the forehead. “Did you find out what she did to him?” Caduceus asked.

“Yes.” Fjord sat down on the room’s other bed. “It was an illusion spell. It should have broken when Beau hit the woman. This,” he gestured at Caleb’s shivering form, “is not part of the spell.”

“What was the illusion?” Jester asked. Fjord looked to Beau and Yasha for help.

“She said something about having him ‘see what he was missing out on’. I assume she was talking about…” Yasha didn’t need to finish the sentence.

Caduceus was not an easy person to make angry, but Genira far surpassed that threshold. While he’d never participated in the act himself and had no intention of ever doing so, he knew how important consent was. He knew how much it hurt to have it taken away. To have it happened to someone he cares for, even if it was just an illusion, made his blood boil. He looked over at Caleb as Veth pulled him into a hug. He then scanned the faces of the rest of the Mighty Nein. Everyone looked about as angry as he felt. That was, except the one he’d most expected it from.

As everyone started doing their own thing, mostly so Caleb no longer had to feel everyone’s eyes on him, he took Beau with him into the hallway. “Are you alright?” he asked.

She wouldn’t stop looking at Caleb with a hopeless expression. “I’m worried about him.”

“Is there something else that we don’t know?”

She signed and finally looked back at him. “I think we need to do some course correcting.” Caduceus didn’t understand what she meant at first. Then a previous conversation between the two of them came back to him.

_ “We’ll step in and course correct if we have to, but for the most part Caleb is the one in control of his fate.” _

He’d told Beau that after the two of them had an intense conversation on the way to the peace negotiations. He deeply wanted to be wrong, but based on Beau’s actions then and today as well as Caleb’s current state, he knew his conclusion was almost certainly accurate. “He has been assaulted like this before?”

She nodded. “I know I shouldn’t tell you because it’s not my story to tell, but I don’t know what to do.”

Caduceus suppressed the urge to sob as he looked back at his dear friend who deserved the best in life and seemed to somehow always end up with the worst. “I don’t know, either.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welp, I did not think this story would be three chapters when I started outlining, but here we are. I quickly realized how much I wanted to happen in this story and how long it would take me to write it. I didn’t want to wait so long between posting, so I split the outline up. (This also gave me an opportunity to use up more prompts, which is great news.) I hope you guys like the story so far.


	2. Support

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Caleb wakes up from a nightmare, leading to him telling the others more about his past.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: Past sexual assault of a minor, nightmares, misunderstandings regarding consent.  
> This was written for the Bad Things Happen Bingo prompt Please Don’t Leave Me. Credit to Theoneupforshenanigans for giving me some inspiration. I'll include his idea in the notes at the end.

Veth refused to let herself sleep. How could she when her boy was so clearly suffering? She needed to hear him speak, know for sure that he'll be alright, before she even thought about resting. For now, she would curl against his chest as he slept.

“Bitte!” Veth flinched as Caleb called out in his sleep. “Bitte. Es tut mir Leid. Verschwinde. Bitte.” She got off of him as he curled himself against the headboard of the bed.

“What happened?” Jester asked. 

Veth heard manic shuffling behind her, presumably the rest of the Mighty Nein crowding around to figure out what was wrong. She tried to get Caleb’s wide, glassy eyes to make direct eye contact with hers. “Caleb, are you okay?” He frantically shook his head and pulled his knees up to his chest. While that certainly wasn’t a good indication of his current mental state, she couldn’t help but feel a little bit relieved that he finally reacted to something one of them said. “We’re here, Cay. You’re alright.”

“She didn’t stop,” he said. “She didn’t stop, wouldn’t get off. They never did. I needed to learn. I didn’t want to, but I needed to. He said I needed to.”

Veth’s brain stopped. It refused to process the implications of what he just said. ‘No…’ The multiple gasps behind her confirmed that others had reached the same conclusion she desperately resisted making. ‘No. There’s no way. He can’t.... No, I can’t be in denial about this. I’ve spent too long telling myself he isn’t hurting as much as he actually is. If I want to help him, I can’t keep doing that. He.. My boy has been assaulted by multiple people multiple times.’

The second the words formed in her head, she couldn’t help herself. She pulled him into a hug. She started to regret it almost immediately. ‘I can’t just hug him without his consent after he told me  _ that _ .’ Luckily, Caleb didn’t have any sort of negative reaction. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m so sorry.”

“Caleb…” she heard Yasha say. Caleb flinched and clung to Veth.

“Out.” Veth said. He was already freaking out, and there was no way everyone staring at him would help. “Everyone out, now.” They all hurried out of the room. “Is this okay? It’s fine if you want me to leave, too. Whatever you want, okay?”

He hugged her tighter. “Bitte verlass mich nicht.” Veth didn’t need to speak Zemnian to understand.

“Okay. It’s alright. It’s not your fault. I’m here. I’m sorry.” How many times had she joked about him needing to get laid? How many times did they talk about their sex lives right in front of him without knowing how it probably affected it? Looking back, he always acted uncomfortable during those times. Why didn’t she do something? Did she just decide not to notice?

She continued repeating the same platitudes over and over, hoping they would somehow get through to him, until he finally calmed down. “I’m sorry.” His voice came out in a monotone, a complete contrast to the extreme emotion he had been displaying moments before.

“No, don’t be. You’re alright.” Veth leaned back, keeping her hands on his shoulders. “I just want you to be okay.”

He let out an empty laugh. “I have not been okay for quite some time, but that’s alright.” Veth fought to keep her utter heartbreak from showing on her face. “Genira just…. brought up some memories from training. Trent… He, ah-”

“You don’t need to tell me if you don’t want to, or if you aren’t ready.”

“I may not be ready, but Beau already knows parts of this. It would be unfair to keep you all in the dark after… that.” ‘Beau knew?’ Veth tried to not feel offended. It was Caleb’s story to tell, and if he wanted to tell someone else first then that was his right. It would be unfair to think otherwise. “You can get the others. I would, ah, rather not have to talk about this more than once.”

“Yeah, whatever you want.” She got off the bed. “Be right back.”

The second Veth left the room and the door closed behind her, the thin wall keeping her emotions from showing collapsed and she started to cry. “Oh, Veth!” Jester ran over and gave her a hug. “It’s okay. You did really good.”

She tried to force a smile. “Thanks.” She looked around at the others. Beau and Yasha sat next to each other against the wall. Fjord and Caduceus were further down the hall. In an unusual turn of events, it seemed Fjord was the one comforting Caduceus and not the other way around. They made their way back over to the group when they noticed Veth.

“How is he?” Fjord asked.

“I mean, he was apparently hurt in the past and then he was hurt in the same way today, so not good!” Veth could feel the despair coursing through her veins turn to anger. ‘Who did this to him? Who did this to my boy?’ Still, she couldn’t let the emotion show now. The rest of the group didn’t deserve to have that turned against them, and Caleb certainly didn’t need to deal with this. She’d have to save her freaking out for later.

“Right, of course he would be upset. I was just asking if he has calmed down.”

She nodded. “He wants to tell us what happened. But we all need to calm down first. This is about him. He needs us.”

“Of course,” Yasha said. Everyone else nodded.

“We’ll all have time to punch a wall later…” Beau mumbled as Veth opened the door to Caleb’s room.

* * *

‘This is just like the boat,’ Caleb thought. ‘I talked to everyone about my past and felt better in the long run. Ja, I felt more exhausted than I have in a long time and Caduceus had to tell me stories to help me fall asleep like a child, but it all ended well. This will, too.’

Veth came back with the rest of the group following her. She looked as if she’d just been crying. Beau and her sat next to Caleb against the headboard as Jester and Caduceus sat on the end of the bed. Fjord and Yasha leaned against the wall. “I, ah, apologize for my reaction yesterday, as well as for waking you tonight.” He ignored everyone’s predictable reaction of insisting he did nothing wrong and none of it was his fault. “I assume you all want an explanation?”

“Only if you want to give us one,” Fjord said. He tried to hide his anger with a neutral expression, but Caleb could see his tense posture. ‘It will be a miracle if I make it through this without someone punching something.’

“Ja, I would rather you not come to your own conclusions.” He took a deep breath and looked down at his hands, which were currently resting in his lap. “When one is acting as a spy and needs the cooperation of another, it can be useful to, ah, make yourself desirable to that person. Trent wanted us all to have the skills required to do so. It started simple, things such as flirting and reading basic body language. Then we had to learn how to… to… please the person we were attempting to…”

“Seduce?” Jester suggested. Caleb flinched and caught Veth shooting her a dirty look.

“No, she is right. I cannot properly tell this story if I cannot say the words required. We needed to learn how to sexually please the person we were attempting to seduce.” The words as he forced them from his throat. Veth took his hand. “He did not teach us anything himself. Instead, he brought in others, sex workers that could show us how to best perform our… task.”

“What kind of sex worker would-?”

“Not now, Jester,” Yasha said.

“We each had many teachers, which makes sense because there are many types of people in this world. We all hated this, especially Eadwulf. Our teachers knew this but they… they had their orders, I assume. I began to feel numb to it after a while. I simply did as I was instructed and… let the teachers do as they need to… demonstrate. I got in trouble for that. The goal was to seduce, and very few people are interested in sleeping with someone that is numb to everything going on. All of it was awful, but forcing myself to stay present and pretend to enjoy what they did was the worst part.”

“How long did that go on for?” Beau asked.

“Oh, it was only a week of our training, four days total.” Veth clenched his hand harder at the word only. “As a final test, we all had to go to parties at the academy and seduce a fellow student. We had to learn something very personal about the person we chose. Astrid completed the task first, then me, and eventually Eadwulf.”

“Caleb, that’s… extremely fucked up,” Beau said.

“Ja, I know. Much of my training was.” He snapped his fingers and summoned Frumpkin. ‘Why hadn’t I thought to do this sooner?’ He let go of Veth’s hand and hugged Frumpking against his chest.

“That goes beyond fucked up,” Fjord said. “You were… You understand that it wasn’t your fault at all, right?”

“... I consented.”

“You just said that you hated it and your teachers knew that.”

“I. consented.”

“I don’t think you understand how consent works.” Caleb looked back up at Yasha as she said that. “Consent isn’t just you not saying no.”

He nodded and buried his face in Frumpkin’s fur. ‘You are so soft and so loyal…’ “I want to sleep. I’m very tired.”

“But-”

“Okay.” Veth shuffled next to him as she laid down. “Are you okay with me staying?”

Caleb smiled and laid parallel to her. Frumpkin curled up between them. “Always.”

Beau put a hand on this shoulder. “We’ll all leave.” Caleb felt her get off the bed. “We can talk more when you’re ready.”

He listened to the footsteps of everyone leaving the room. “Thank you, Veth.”

Veth smiled and whipped a tear from his eyes. “No need. Let’s just sleep.”

* * *

Yasha hated everything about this. Caleb just told everyone in the group about one of the worst things to ever happen to him, then he ended it by acting as if it wasn’t that big of a deal and now everyone was expected to just go back to sleep? Not that she had been sleeping very soundly before. She couldn’t stop thinking about Genira, who was likely sleeping peacefully, completely oblivious to the pain and suffering she’d caused.

“I don’t feel comfortable leaving this room with just the two of them,” Fjord said. He leaned against the wall on the right side of the door. “Caleb is in no condition to fight and Veth, while very skilled, may not be enough if something happens.”

“Oh, I don’t think-” Caduceus cut himself off. They all knew that Fjord didn’t seriously expect an attack. He just wanted an excuse to stay near Caleb.

“Beau, would you like to join me?”

She agreed. As the two of them took their places on either side of the door, Caduceus, Yasha, and Jester made their way to the other room the Gentleman had arranged for them. While all of them were struggling to process the new information they’d learned about Caleb’s past, Yasha couldn’t help but pay particular attention to Caduceus’s reaction. He typically acted as a rock for the rest of them. He’d keep his cool through anything and offer emotional support when needed. Not tonight. Fjord had to calm him from a panic attack after Caleb’s initial outburst, and now…

Caduceus collapsed on one of the beds the second they entered the room. Yasha took the other. Jester paced around the room while ranting and making wild hand gestures. “That’s so stupid! They were all sex workers. They should know better than anyone how important consent is and they just did that stuff to kids? Mama would never stand for any of this.”

“Oh, I’m sure Trent had his way of finding people,” Yasha said.

Jester groaned and threw herself on Yasha’s bed. “I know, but like, he’s just the worst. He already was the worst, but now he’s super the worst and I don’t know what to do about it.” Yasha took her hand. “I just want Caleb to be okay…”

“Well, one thing we need to do is make sure he understands consent. I think you could help with that.”

“Yeah, that too. I’ll talk to him about it later. I don’t want him to keep blaming himself for something that wasn’t his fault. He does that too much already.”

“I think, if we’d asked him to, Caleb would have slept with that woman,” Caduceus said.

Jester sat up. “Ugh, I know. I was thinking that, too. I hate it.”

“Are you alright, Caduceus?” Yasha asked. “You’ve been upset. Well, more upset than the rest of us.”

“I’m fine. You don’t have to worry about me.” He sat up against the headrest. “It’s just that… I’ve never felt any desire to have sex. I’m not particularly repulsed by it, but I’m still not pleased by the thought. The thought of someone I care so deeply about being forced to do it, violated in such a way, it hurts a lot. I want to be able to support you all, but that entire conversation made my skin crawl. I couldn’t bring myself to say anything because I knew the second I did I would start…” He whipped tears from his eyes. “I can’t make this about me.”

“Aw…” Jester went over to him and gave him a hug. “You always support us. You let everyone vent to you, and you’re always super calm and smart and stuff. You can let us help Caleb this time, especially if you don’t think you can handle talking about this.”

“Thank you. That’s… that’s helpful. I fear I would just make Caleb feel worse if I were to try and talk to him.”

“I feel that way, too,” Yasha said. “It made me feel very violated when my tribe tried to pick a mate for me. It’s not the same, but I feel as if I understand a little bit. I don’t want him to feel that way anymore.”

Jester looked over at her pouting. “Now I want to hug both of you. Get over here.” Yasha smiled and joined them on the other bed. They formed a sort of cuddle pile. “Good. Everything will be fine. We’ll talk about this more in the morning, make sure Caleb knows he never has to do that sort of thing ever again, and kill Genira. Easy.”

Caduceus laughed. “With the way Fjord and Beau were acting, I’ll be surprised if she lives to sunrise.”

“Oh! Is that what you think they’re doing?”

“I hadn’t thought of that,” Yasha said, “but that makes sense, especially since Beau was ready to kill her earlier today.”

“Aw, I wanna go with them now!”

“You still can.”

Jester looked up from the cuddle pile to stare at the door before collapsing back down. “Nah, they’ve got this. I’d rather stay here and hug you guys.”

Yasha hugged her tighter. They were all a team. They’d always support one another. She could only hope that would be enough to help someone as hurt as their dear wizard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for reading. All of your super nice comments last chapter were amazing. There's just one chapter left and I hope you will all find it very satisfying. As you can probably tell, my stories rely heavily on my own headcanons regarding both the things that happened during Caleb's training and the structure of the training itself. If anyone is curious about more of the specifics of that, let me know in the comments. I have a habit of instinctually filling in holes in canon with my own very complex headcanons. I'm happy fanfiction is giving me an outlet to do that.  
> Theoneupforshenanigans idea: "when he says the phrase in Zemnian and the person he's talking to can't understand him and he's to far gone to use Common."


	3. Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fjord and Beau get revenge before Jester and Caleb had a meaningful conversation about consent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: Past sexual assault of a minor, in-depth conversation about consent, self-hatred.  
> This was written for the Bad Things Happen Bingo prompt Cry into Chest.

Fjord watched the rest of the team go into their other room before turning to Beau. “You know how you almost killed that shopkeeper but Yasha and I stopped you?”

“Yeah.”

“I changed my mind.”

She groaned. “Don’t tempt me. I know we shouldn’t actually do that.”

“Maybe, but I don’t see why we shouldn’t go and have some fun in her shop.”

The two of them smiled at each other before racing out of the building. They made it to the shop about a few minutes later. “Aw, she got rid of Jester’s penis drawing.” Beau pointed to where Jester had been doodling on the wall earlier.

“We can draw more inside if you want, but we should give ourselves a time limit. She could have an alarm spell on the place. How about five minutes?”

“Sounds good.” She cracked her knuckles. “But I don’t want to waste time drawing dicks. I wanna smash her shit.”

Fjord thought about summoning his sword as Beau kicked the door down, but realized that would be a little bit overkill. There was no audible alarm, so they ran in and got to work. Fjord attacked the place fueled by a cold fury. He thought about Avantika and how he felt after sleeping with her. The act itself wasn’t bad and she was never forceful, yet he couldn’t help but feel wrong afterwards. He wasn’t actually interested in her and the arousal he felt was… off, tainted in some way. It was far from a pleasant experience. He left her room with a deep desire to take a long, scolding bath to take away the deep gross feeling. And he chose to sleep with her.

Picturing Caleb, someone he cares about like family, being told he had to put himself through that as a child under threat of punishment, made him punch a hole through the wall of the store. Fjord was the sort of person that never really developed any sort of sexual or romantic feelings until he got to know a person. While he didn’t like to presume these sorts of things, he had a feeling Caleb felt similarly. Either way, his training taught him that his own wants didn’t matter. Fjord wondered if Caleb ever used his training while he was on the run as many people did. He punched the wall again.

“Okay, I think it’s time,” Beau said. Fjord looked around the room, which now looked as if a Tornado had blown through. ‘Perfect.’

“Wait, one more thing.” He went over to where he’d see Genira take a healing potion from and found twenty more there that were not smashed. He divided them between Beau and himself. “Okay, let’s go.”

Seeing as it was still pitch black out and neither felt they could go to sleep any time soon, the two of them found a shitty bar to hang out in. They don’t talk at first, instead choosing to silently celebrate their victory.

It didn’t take long for the euphoria to fade and for the anger to creep back in. “That didn’t feel as good as I’d thought it would,” Fjord said.

“Well,” Beau took a sip of her beer, “she isn’t the one we’re actually mad at, is she? I mean, what she did was awful and I want to kill her slowly and painfully, but she isn’t the one who made the last two years of Caleb’s childhood a living nightmare.”

He clenched his fist. “I want nothing more than to Eldritch Blast that man over and over until he disintegrates. He has hurt so many people. Caleb was able to get out and his life is still dominated by him. It’s like Trent took everything he was and twisted it to hurt him. It’s no wonder Caleb goes by a different name now. Even if it was just a disguise at first, I would do everything I could to distance myself from a life like that.”

“Caleb mentioned during his story that he ‘got in trouble’ for not being… enthusiastic enough. I don’t really know anything about Trent’s punishments, but that…” She shivered.

“Caleb told me that Trent would always make his punishments be a natural consequence of failure. I… don’t want to think about what that means here. I’m more hung up on the way he insistent that he had consented. Yasha’s right, he clearly doesn’t understand how wrong that is. He was underage and currently being brainwashed. Even if he hadn’t clearly not wanted to do what was asked of him, it was impossible for him to consent.”

“I tried to talk to him about that when he first told me about this, but apparently I suck at talking about that sort of thing. The conversation boiled down to me saying I would beat anyone up that tried to tell him he had to have sex when he didn’t want to.”

“And that you did.” Fjord wasn’t shocked to learn Beau knew about this beforehand. Her and Veth had been the first to learn about Caleb’s parents as well. Caleb obviously felt more comfortable talking to those two than anyone else. He couldn’t fault him for trusting others more than him. He was just happy Caleb had anyone he trusted enough to open up to. He certainly needed it. “We’ll talk to Caleb when we can, help him recover from this. I’m confident he will heal with time.”

The two of them sat together at the bar, drinking and trying to keep their minds off of that night’s revelations, until the sun started to come up. They decided to leave and make their way back to the Gentleman’s place. They found the man himself on the way to the rooms. “Good morning,” he said. “It seems you had a busy night.”

“Yes,” Fjord said. “We were just going back to our rooms.”

“I see. I’ll let you go, but first I thought you would like to know that I’ve received word of some strange criminal activity in town. A magic shop was found more or less completely destroyed and the only things taken were some healing potions.” His eyes drifted down towards the vials sticking out of Fjord’s jacket.

“Oh, um-”

“I support the people who work for me, but I don’t appreciate this kind of chaos in my city.”

“Do you know the shopkeeper, Genira?” Beau asked.

“At least you two will admit it was you. No, I’ve never met her personally.”

“She’s the reason we needed those rooms last night.” They’d initially planned on using Caleb’s mansion spell and had told the gentleman such when they checked in with him. They had to go to him later and fill him in on the situation, explaining that Caleb was not feeling well enough to cast the spell that night.

“I see…” His eyes lost a bit of their coldness. “Well, I appreciate your desire to avenge your own, but this is a little bit extreme, you understand. Perhaps I would show more sympathy if I understood what exactly happened, but for now you are on your own cleaning this up.”

“Forgive us, but we can’t tell you what happened,” Fjord said. “It was a very… personal attack on Caleb.”

“Ah… I think I understand your meaning…” He scowled. “In that case, good job. I’ll take care of this for you.” He walked away without waiting for them to respond.

Fjord looked over at Beau. “Should I not have said that?”

“It’s probably not good to tell people things it took Caleb more than a year to tell us, or even imply them, but I think that was fine.”

“I hadn’t meant to. Still, maybe this means Genira will be out of business for a while.”

She smiled. “All’s well that ends well.”

* * *

Jester was the last of the cuddle pile to wake up. She woke up to a note from Yasha telling her that they had gone over to the other room to check on Caleb. She took a second to pray to the Traveler on her way to meet them. ‘I really want Caleb to have a good day ‘cause he’s been really sad. He needs all of our help. I’m not really sure what to do to help, but I’m gonna try.’

She knocked on the door. Much to her surprise, Caleb was the one to greet her. “Good morning, my friend.” He stepped aside to let her walk in. There was a wide selection of breakfast food spread out on a table against the wall. Everyone else sat on the beds together eating. “Veth has already eaten most of the meats Caduceus and Yasha were nice enough to bring for us, but there are plenty of-”

“Donuts!” She ran over and started piling jelly donuts onto her plate.

“We thought we could all use a little bit of a treat,” Caduceus said.

“‘ank you!” she said, already taking a bite of her delicious breakfast. She took a seat between Fjord and Veth. “How are you feeling, Caleb?”

“Ah, I am… as well as I could be considering last night. I thank you all for helping me.”

Beau playfully punched his shoulder. “No problem, man.”

“If you all don’t mind, I know there are many things we had wanted to do today, but I am not sure I’m up for anything right now.”

“I can stay here with you!” Jester said, happy for an opportunity to have some time alone with Caleb.

“Oh, you don’t need to do that. Thank you.”

“I need to make some more pamphlets anyway. Don’t worry about it.” Asking Caleb not to worry about something typically had the opposite effect, but this time he did seem to relax. Jester could have sworn he also looked relieved.

As the others finished up their meals and left, Jester moved to sit next to Caleb. “Are you okay with talking a little bit about last night?”

His posture stiffened. “Is that why you wished to stay behind?”

“No, silly, I wanted to hang out with you. I just also want to talk about some things because you seem kinda confused about things and I know a lot about it because my mama talked about it to me a lot growing up because it’s really important and she’s, like, an expert.”

“I’m not against talking to you about it some more, but… I don’t want to discuss any of the specifics. I…”

“Oh, don’t worry. I’m not gonna ask you about that stuff. You don’t have to talk at all if you don’t want to.” He nodded. She went through the list of things she came up with last night that she needed to tell him. “First thing, you should never ever ever do something sexual with someone when you don’t want to. Even when you really like this person and you like doing all these other sex things with them, if you don’t wanna do something you shouldn’t have to do it. It’s like in Tusk love. Guinevere was all for having sex with Oskar, but when he wanted to-”

“Okay, thank you, Jester, but I would rather not hear about that right now.”

“Right, sorry. Anyway, you can also withdraw consent any time and no one can make you feel guilty about that. My mom actually has a system where if someone pays to sleep with her and changes their mind in the middle of them doing it, they get all their money back, that way no one feels like they need to keep going ‘cause they already spent money. She also keeps them at the top of her waiting list for if they are up for it another time. Not all sex workers can do things like that, but I’m happy Mama does. She also has Bluud to make people leave if she changes her mind, though that’s pretty rare since Nicodranas has pretty good laws protecting sex workers so most people would leave on their own. Also, when you’re having sex, it’s important for everyone involved to check in on each other. Hmmm, what else…?”

“You’ve already said a lot. You don’t need-”

“Right! One last thing, arousal isn’t a sign of consent. That’s just your body reacting to what’s going on. Mama compared it to laughing when someone tickles you. Sometimes you don’t want to get tickled, but you laugh anyway because that’s what your body does when you get tickled.”

“Yes, that makes sense. Thank you for… explaining.” She noticed that he had been rubbing his left arm for most of this conversation. ‘Stupid me trying to remember my list and not paying attention.’

“Are you sure you’re okay with talking about this?”

“Ja, that is fine. It makes me a little bit uncomfortable, but I don’t think that will ever not be the case.”

She frowned. “I don’t want to you to _never_ be able to talk about sex. Maybe it’ll get better the more you do it.”

“We can hope, I suppose. I have gotten better at talking about Trent since my first conversation with you all about it.”

“See? That’s good. I also wanted to ask you about those sex workers that taught you. I don’t understand why they would do what they did. They should know how important consent is.”

“Ah, well….” He looked away from her and let out a shuttered breath. “One time, Eadwulf told Astrid and I that one of his teachers was rather forceful. Astrid got mad that night and snuck out to find him. He had no idea what Astrid was talking about and seemed horrified by the idea of assaulting a teenager. The three of us theorized that Trent in some way forced them to teach us and altered their memories afterwards.”

Jester only then realized how weird Caleb’s previous description of things had been. Trent needed the training to be secret, and he just let a bunch of people in on it? This made more sense. It was sick, but made sense. “I’m sorry, Caleb.”

He shook his head. “Everyone is acting as if I am only a victim in this. I even told you all last night about me using my training to trick a boy at a party as part of my final test. Even my teachers were almost certainly not willing. When Eadwulf came to me crying about not wanting to do these things, I told him he didn’t have a choice.” He started to cry. 

Jester pulled him against her chest. “It’s okay, Caleb. That wasn’t your fault at all. You told Eadwulf that because you thought you didn’t have a choice either. And you didn’t. Trent made you do so many bad things, but none of them were your fault. I’m sorry that all happened to you. You didn’t deserve any of it.”

Caleb sobbed against her for a long while before relaxing in her arms. She began telling him stories of the Traveler to cheer him up. He eventually fell asleep as she petted his hair and gave him a kiss on the forehead.

* * *

Caleb woke up from a dreamless sleep to the sound of his friends’ voices. “I wish we could do more to help him,” Veth said.

“I think we’ve done all we can today,” Yasha said. “Thank you for talking to him, Jester.”

“Of course!” Jester pulled him closer against her. ‘I’m still laying on her. I was sleeping on Jester. What am I doing? I can’t do this.’ “I want Caleb to be happy. I don’t think he is right now, but he will be.”

Caleb couldn’t find the energy to move, or even let them know he was awake. He knew he needed this even if he’d done nothing to earn it. He didn’t deserve love, especially not romantic love. He’d viewed himself tainted for a long time for many reasons. And yet, maybe, just maybe, his sexual history shouldn’t be one of those reasons after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for reading. I was not expecting to post this today. I don't know if it was the euphoria of Trump losing the election or just me really wanting to finish this story, but got a sudden urge to just sit down and finish this thing.  
> I don't know if anyone caught it, but I personally headcanon both Fjord and Caleb as Demisexual. Caleb would probably also label himself bisexual and lean more towards woman romantically. Fjord is almost exclusively attracted to woman but can imagine himself with a man. In case anyone cares at all about my opinions for the other characters, I headcanoned Caduceus as aroace before the ace part was confirmed (go me!), Beau is a Lesbian in canon so there isn't much to headcanon about, Veth is the straight friend of the team, Yasha is also a lesbian, and Molly is pansexual but for some reason my brain insists that he would only be romantically attracted to men and nonbinary people. I don't know why my brain comes up with some of these things, but it's very insistent.  
> If anyone is interested, I'm still taking ideas for the following prompts: Human Shield, Disowned by Family, Came Back Wrong (the prompt is specifically about coming back from the dead. I'm very reluctant to write about Molly given what's happening in canon right now. I don't like writing things that could turn out to contradict canon two episodes later), Electrocution, Buried in Rubble, Undeserved Reputation, Public Humiliation, Caught in a Storm, and Confined to Bed Rest.


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